The Way Back
by UA
Summary: She was going home. To a place—a town—that she hadn't set foot in since she was nineteen years old.
1. Chapter 1

**The Way Back**

* * *

 **xx1xx**

* * *

"That's the last of it," Andrea announced from the bottom of the stairs, her voice muffled by the towering stack of boxes she carried in her arms and distance.

Carol shook her head at her friend, a few curls loosing from her messy top knot and kissing the nape of her neck. She propped her hands on her slim hips when Andrea warded off her approach with eyes as pale and playful as a summer sea.

"It's like Jenga. One wrong move and…" She trailed off meaningfully, carefully picking her way around the cars scattered around the parking lot until she reached Carol's Cherokee and the U-hail trailer hitched to the back. Only when she had safely stowed the last of Carol's belongings in the back did she turn to her and offer up a smile.

Carol tried to match the sunny expression, but she didn't quite succeed. Instead, she felt the downward pull of imaginary marionette strings at the corners of her mouth, and it was all she could do not to crumple completely when Andrea drew her into a tight, sure embrace.

"Stop," Andrea muttered close to her ear. "Before you make me cry, too." She huffed out a laugh when Carol tightened her arms around her in response. "This is a good thing. It really _is,_ " she insisted. "You and those girls…you're going to be okay."

Carol sighed and let her arms fall again to her sides. "I know. It's just…"

"Just what?" Andrea gently prodded.

Just what, indeed, Carol mused, entirely unsure if she understood it herself. She was going home. To a place—a town—that she hadn't set foot in since she was nineteen years old. She should feel happy, shouldn't she? She was leaving behind an apartment they'd outgrown the very moment Lizzie and Mika had stepped through its doors. She was leaving behind the high rises and the concrete for the green fields of Georgia farm country and room to breathe. _And_ she was leaving behind the one friend who'd kept her afloat when she thought she'd drown in the ocean of her own doubts after leaving Ed and his angry words and hurtful hands once and for all.

As if reading her mind, Andrea reminded her, "I'm only a phone call away."

"And I'm not even two hours out of the city," Carol jumped in before Andrea could say anything more. "I know all this, Andrea. I do. I just…I'm going _home_."

"You're going home."

Tugging her bottom lip between her teeth for but a moment, Carol implored her to understand before blurting, "What if I don't know the way back?"

"There are maps for that," Andrea quipped, her eyes dancing once more. "Don't worry so much. I called ahead. Dale's expecting you. If you take too long, he knows to send out a search party."

Carol groaned, flinging her head back and staring up at a dreary, colorless sky while she tried to wrangle her emotions under control. She blinked against the tears she felt stinging her eyes again and grasped Andrea's offered hand blindly. "I'm serious," she finally said, knuckling away the evidence of her weak moment when she had calmed. "Andrea, I…"

"I know you are," Andrea murmured softly, giving her hand a gentle squeeze. "Who says I'm not? There are probably maps for that kind of thing, too. Just ask my therapist. Better yet, ask Lizzie's."

The giggles that spilled from Carol's lips then were completely unexpected and wholly inappropriate, but they lightened her somber mood and she squeezed Andrea's hand in gratitude. "Oh, God. Lizzie's therapist. What am I going to do if she hates her new one?"

"Does she like the one she has now?"

"I don't…well, no," Carol eventually responded.

"She'll like her new therapist fine, and if she doesn't, she'll learn to like her."

"Just like that?" Carol smiled.

"Just like that," Andrea smiled back, tugging her back into another hug. "I'm going to miss you."

"You better come visit."

"You know I will," Andrea murmured into her hair. "Soon as things settle down at work. You know how Blake likes to keep me under his thumb."

"That's not the only thing he'd like to keep you under," Carol muttered with a wry twist of her lips, rolling her eyes when Andrea feigned shock at her words. "Don't even deny it."

"I used to think you were so sweet," she deadpanned. "Now I know better."

"Now you know better," Carol agreed with a tearful laugh. With Andrea's help, she shut and secured the trailer, and before she knew it, her hand was on the jeep's door handle and Andrea was peering inside the open window at the trio of sleep-rumpled little girls in the back seat.

"Last chance," she grinned as she ruffled the nearest head of hair, which happened to be Sophia's strawberry mop. "You sure nobody's got to pee?"

* * *

xxx

* * *

They made three separate bathroom stops between Atlanta and King County, and Carol was thankful for every last one of them when she finally turned onto the half-remembered little country road that would lead them to their new ( _old_ ) home.

It was narrow and riddled with potholes.

So many potholes, in fact, the Cherokee might as well have been a giant yellow mouse carefully navigating its way through an endless stretch of Swiss cheese, the overstuffed U-haul the overweight cat lurching closely on its heels. The fanciful thought made Carol smile, and she almost turned around, ready to share the joke, until she remembered the only person that would fully appreciate it was fast asleep. Instead she sighed, tightening her grip around the steering wheel again until her knuckles blanched, and drove on.

Gradually, the road grew wider, the trees that hugged it a little less thick and claustrophobic. Weathered fences bordered fields just beginning to lose summer's green shine, livestock and fat bales of hay dots of tawny color here and there.

Carol startled when Lizzie's small, curious voice piped up from the back seat, the tablet previously held in her hands forgotten as she leaned as far as the safety belt cinched across her hips would allow.

Gripping the seat in front of her with pale fingers, Lizzie asked, "Are those cows, Ma'am?"

Six months in, and the little girl's formality still burrowed deep beneath Carol's skin and threatened to fester. She knew Ryan had taught and fostered the quality in both of his children as a show of polite manners, but Carol couldn't help but think Lizzie was using it as a way to continue to keep her at a distance. Making a mental note to broach her concerns with the new therapist when they met her later in the week, Carol hummed a quiet response. "Yes, Lizzie. Those are cows."

"Will there be cows at our farm, Mama?"

Carol smiled, heartened by the show of interest on her daughter's part after a ( _mostly_ ) silent trip. "I'm afraid not, Sweetie. Our farm hasn't been a _real_ farm for a very long time. But there _is_ a big old farmhouse and a barn and a swing. And," she added, "there's plenty of room to ride your bike."

Sophia's freckled face fell. "I don't have a bike."

"I don't either," Lizzie lamented.

"I want a bike," Mika pouted, her brown eyes soft and heavy still with sleep. "Are we there yet?"

"Almost," Carol answered her, grateful for the distraction. "Look for the blue mailbox."

"With the daisies on it," Lizzie and Mika chorused.

Pleased that they remembered, Carol nodded. "With the daisies on it. It shouldn't be that much further."

* * *

xxx

* * *

It wasn't much further, barely half a mile then half of _that_ down a little dirt path before Carol's childhood home came into view. Rain beaded on the windshield even as a long cloud of dust kicked up behind them, and the first drops had started to fall in earnest by the time Carol parked the jeep behind an old Ford truck that looked like it had seen better days.

"Mama," Sophia breathed, her hazel eyes big and round and wide with something akin to fright. "It looks like a spooky house."

"A spooky house?" Mika fretted, folding her short, stubby legs beneath her and rubbing her braid anxiously across her lips. "Do ghosts live here, Ms. Carol?"

Lizzie perked up at the mention of ghosts, moving to stand up before her lap restraint snugged tight across her skinny hips and rudely yanked her backward. She fumbled with the belt for a few seconds more before she was free. "I want to see."

Carol laughed. "There aren't any ghosts here." _Just a lot of long-buried memories,_ she mused as she watched a tall, vaguely familiar figure move across the tree-shadowed porch and descend the steps, pulling a dark hood over its head and preventing Carol from puzzling out its identity.

"Who's that man?" Mika's chin wobbled with uncertainty as she asked the question and she pressed herself ever closer to Sophia with each step that the stranger took toward them.

"That's not Uncle Dale," Sophia whispered.

"No," Carol murmured in agreement, instinctively reaching for the door lock as the figure continued its approach. But it was, most certainly, a man, a broad shouldered and imposing one at that. "It's not. Lizzie. Sit down."

Lizzie complied without complaint, allowing Mika to thread their fingers together and pull her closer.

Inching her window down, Carol kept her other hand on her phone, just in case. "Sir. I don't know who you are," she began.

"You so sure 'bout that, Red?" the man rasped in a whiskey-soaked voice.

With a grin that was devilish and wide, he lifted two large, work-roughened hands to push back the hood, and Carol could do nothing more than gasp as the pieces of recognition rapidly started to fall into place.

"What's the matter? Old Merle look like the Big Bad Wolf to you? Just bein' neighborly."

* * *

xxx

* * *

Merle Dixon wouldn't ever be mistaken for a saint, but he wasn't the Big Bad Wolf either, not by a long shot. With the rain coming down in silver sheets, he unloaded the U-haul, carrying box after box across the puddle-strewn yard and up the creaky porch steps into the farmhouse. The bigger boxes, the few pieces of furniture she'd brought with them from Atlanta, he promised to get the next day, after church.

Carol nearly spit her mouthful of water across the room, and as one, from their cozy pile of blankets on the living room sofa, the girls looked up from their bowls of cereal. "You? Merle Dixon? In a church?"

Far from being offended at her incredulous reaction, Merle merely grinned. He helped himself to a healthy swig from the bottle of water she held out to him before explaining himself. "A lot of things have changed 'round these parts since you been gone, Red, but not _that_. Church is still standing, ain't it? If it didn't burn to the ground when you hitched yourself to that asshole husband of yours…" He wisely dropped the subject when Carol's eyes cut to Sophia meaningfully, and he followed her into the kitchen, where he pulled out a chair and crossed his arms over the back while she puttered around before doing the same. "Figured _you'd_ be at church, with your little 'uns."

Picking absently at the label on her water bottle, Carol picked up the abandoned thread of conversation, her voice soft and somewhat wistful. "A lot of things _have_ changed, Merle. And not just around here."

"The old man said you'd divorced the prick. Damn-near threw a party. Didn't mention the little stairsteps in there. Last I seen you 'round here, you were all starry-eyed and shit 'bout the oldest."

"Lizzie and Mika are mine," Carol told him, "but they're not _mine_."

"Ain't makin' no sense, girl," Merle grumbled before draining his water bottle and crushing it against his palm. He frowned when Carol promptly snatched it out of his hand.

"I'm their legal guardian," she explained, "not their biological mother. They lost their father to cancer six months ago. Their mother died a year before that. In a sense, I guess you could say their father willed them to me."

Merle leaned back, started drumming his fingertips against the back of his chair. "That's some heavy shit right there."

Carol's lips quirked into a smile. "Trust you to put it into perspective."

Merle grinned back at her. "I just call it like I see it. You said he willed 'em to you. That make things permanent?"

* * *

xxx

* * *

Merle's question lingered and lurked in the back of Carol's mind for the rest of the day. She thought about it when she made the girls peanut butter and jelly sandwiches for an early dinner. She thought about it when she combed Mika's thick, sweet-smelling hair into sections after her bath, weaving it into twin braids that trailed down her tiny back. She thought about it when she tucked Lizzie's blankets snug beneath her chin and dropped the softest of kisses to the tip of her nose. She thought about it when Sophia, misgivings and growing pains aside, said her prayers for the night, including Lizzie and Mika in her close circle of loved ones. Long after the rain had stopped and the moon painted everything in slashes of silver shadows, Carol thought about it. And then she thought about it some more.

Andrea's voice was sluggish with sleep when she answered the phone, her grumbling curses garbled before the connection cleared and she sounded more alert. "Carol? That you?"

"It's me," Carol sighed into the receiver. She said nothing else, simply breathed into the phone and listened to Andrea's breathing in turn. She groaned into her pillow when she realized her friend was patiently waiting her out. "I'm sorry. I know it's late, but…"

"Hey, I told you I was just a phone call away, didn't I?" Andrea reminded her. "I just expected you to keep it between business hours," she teased. After a beat, she spoke again, and her voice this time was much more serious. "You know I was kidding, right? You know you can talk to me about anything." When Carol still didn't answer her, her tone grew even more concerned. "Carol, Honey. You're scaring me. Is everything okay? Did something happen with one of the girls? Did Lizzie have one of her episodes? I think I have that new therapist's home number around here somewhere. Just hold on a sec."

"The girls are fine," Carol blurted, before Andrea could work herself up anymore, before she could disturb the poor therapist in the middle of the night. Not for one of Lizzie's states of utter panic, but one of hers. "They're getting along better than ever." And it was true. She didn't know how long it would last, but she planned to bask in the moment for as long as she could. "They're getting along better than ever, and I've been thinking…"

"That never ends well," Andrea remarked dryly.

"Hush, you," Carol smiled into the darkness.

"You know I love you, right?"

"Love you, too," Carol murmured. "Now let me talk."

"So…you've been thinking. We've established that never ends well. Go."

"We haven't…oh. Dammit, Andrea."

"Must be serious," Andrea mused solemnly over the line. "You never swear."

"I do, too."

"Hardly ever," Andrea insisted. "Carol. Honey, you have my undivided attention now. Just spit it out."

Carol took a deep breath and did just that. "I want you to help me adopt the girls."

* * *

 **Forgive me for posting another unfinished story. I am weak, a mere mortal.**

 **;)**

 **Seriously...I'm sorry for this. Apparently, my go-to method of trying to clear up my writer's block on my other stories is to start completely new ones, lol. To be fair, I was simply trying to get the creative juices flowing again by using an Autumn prompt list and giving you guys a little Fall-flavored one shot. 2600+ words later, though, and I realized I had another multi-chapter story on my hands, haha.**

 **And it is so far from my best stuff.**

 **I proofed it, yes. I probably missed a few things and didn't rework some of the phrases in the best possible way, but I didn't go back over it and scrap much because honestly? Just letting the words and the story flow really helped, if that makes sense (and it had the added benefit of unblocking me on certain section of one of my other stories).**

 **So.**

 **So. There were around 40 prompts total. I probably won't use all of them, and some will be used in the barest of senses. I'll probably stick to the format I have going now, with each chapter spanning a single day (this story is basically a single October in the characters' lives) unless there's a whole bunch of stuff happening in that day. ;) I'm thinking we're looking at a minimum of 31 chapters if all goes according to plan.**

 **Newest chapters are usually posted on my tumblr account first, so head on over there and check it out, follow me if you want. I'm shimmershae.**

 **Okay. Enough Shae rambling, lol.**

 **Hopefully, you'll enjoy the story. Let me know what you think. Feedback is love, after all**

 **Thanks so much for reading! Until next time.**


	2. Chapter 2

**The Way Back**

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 **xx2xx**

* * *

As an only child growing up, Carol had always wanted a sister or brother. Bigger or little, it didn't much matter to her. She just wanted a friend that would never leave her. Like Andrea never left Amy, even if she sometimes wanted to, and loud-mouthed Merle Dixon never went anywhere his little brother couldn't follow. All her birthday candle wishes and letters pleading with Santa went unanswered, and eventually, Carol learned to accept that she was always going to be on her own. As the years wore on, she moved past her tears and sent up thankful prayers instead that there wasn't anybody else but her when her parent's marriage finally fell apart. There wasn't anybody else but her that had to wake up, day after day, and swim against a terrible, endless rip current just to keep from drowning in the ocean of distance that had formed between two people who once claimed to love each other. That kind of life wasn't any kind of life for _one_ child. Forget about two. And for all their failings, she felt a new kind of respect for her parents after Sophia was born. They'd loved each other once. Madly. Passionately. _Tumultuously_. And yet, somehow, they'd known it wasn't going to work out in the end. They'd known it was better not to bring another child into a marriage that was doomed to crash and burn from the start. Carol knew her parents had loved each other, _once_. But Ed? He'd never owned even the smallest part of _her_ heart, and she didn't fight him on his choice to have a vasectomy two days after Sophia's birth. The simple surgery was performed with her wholehearted blessing. Any buried dreams Carol might have harbored of filling this house with babies had died long before she'd ever agreed to accept Ed's hand in marriage. Sophia, like her mother before her, was an only child.

At least she _had_ been for the first seven years of her young life. Now she had sisters. Two of them. And where Sophia went? Mika, and inevitably Lizzie, followed.

Stepping through her daughter's open bedroom door, Carol regarded the scene in front of her with a smile.

Amidst a sea of blankets, pillows, and well-loved dolls, in the very center of a massive four-poster bed that had probably predated the room it stood in, a pile of little girls slept. And it could only be called a pile because there was no other word for it. Little arms and legs were everywhere. Never mind that she'd tucked Lizzie and Mika into their own beds halfway down the hall. Never mind that Sophia had promised she was okay sleeping all by her lonesome, had seemed excited, in fact, to finally have a bed to herself again. The two older girls fit together like living, breathing puzzle pieces, and Mika was sprawled out atop the both of them, with one braided pigtail falling across Sophia's dream-furrowed brow and another fluttering beneath Lizzie's nose.

She knew she was being sentimental, silly even, but Carol wished she had her phone on hand to snap a quick picture, send it to Andrea. There wasn't enough time, though. There never was any more in the mornings. If Sophia had found the transition difficult, going from an only child to one of three, Carol had found it twice as hard dressing three little girls to their satisfaction and that day's whims and making it out the front door at anything remotely resembling a decent hour. Crossing the room on careful, quiet feet, she knelt at Sophia's side and gently brushed Mika's pigtail from her face. "Sophia? Sweetie?"

Sophia frowned and wrinkled her nose when Carol traced a fingertip across her furrowed brows and down the length of her nose. She whined, and with great reluctance, blinked her hazel eyes open. "Mama?"

Carol watched her short legs stretch beneath the mound of blankets, could barely make out the motion of ten little toes fanning out and doing the same. Her smile soft with affection, she murmured her daughter's name again when those pretty hazel eyes disappeared beneath sleep-heavy lids. "No you don't, Sweetie. You can't go back to sleep. We don't want to be late."

"But school's not 'til tomorrow," Sophia mumbled into her pillow.

She sounded so aggrieved and so very sleep-slurred that Carol could only laugh. "It's not," she agreed. "We're not going to school. We're going to church, and we're going to be late if you sleepyheads don't wake up," she declared, including Lizzie upon noticing her blue eyes were open and watching her intently. "Now get up. Get up, get up, get up," she said in a singsong voice, tickling Sophia's sides and making her squeal. For good measure, Carol tickled Lizzie, too, and the little girl smiled before squirming away. "I mean it. We don't want to be late, do we?"

Sophia whined but slid out of bed, rubbing at her eyes with her fists and tossing a baleful look at the little girl that still snored peacefully, completely oblivious, as usual to all the commotion surrounding her. "No fair. What about Mika?"

Carol had Mika scooped up and cradled her against her chest before Lizzie could chime in with her own protest. "I'll take care of Mika. You two go brush your teeth."

Sophia pouted but shuffled out of the room dutifully.

Lizzie, on the other hand, lingered in the doorway, her small fingers fidgeting and somewhat fretful as they circled and twisted at the doorknob.

"You know you can ask me anything, Lizzie. Anything at all, don't you?"

This time, Lizzie barely hesitated before nodding her head.

"Well," Carol prodded, adjusting her hold on Mika when the tiny girl moaned and wrapped her arms and legs around her in a clinging hold. "Really, Lizzie. Anything at all. So you just go ahead, okay? Just go ahead and say whatever you have to say. I promise I won't be mad." She waited, breath bated and heart held in check for whatever spilled from Lizzie's unpredictable mouth. When the words came, they weren't at all what she'd been expecting.

"Ma'am, what is church?"

* * *

xxx

* * *

In spite of Carol's best efforts, they were late anyway. As it turned out, they weren't the only ones.

A pretty girl with a bright ( _if somewhat harried_ ) smile and short brunette hair scampered up the church steps just ahead of them, pulling a young man behind her. The young man scrambled to remove the baseball cap from his head and tucked it awkwardly against his chest as the girl pulled the heavy wooden doors of the church open and swept up the aisle, on a mission it seemed. A few words between her and a tall, lanky youth, and a quiet, questioning murmur soon filled the small building.

Carol used the distraction to squeeze herself and the girls into the only available space left, a small section of the final pew. Then she watched as a man she recognized as her long-time neighbor, Hershel Greene, stood up and made his apologies, ushering the boy to precede him.

"Excuse me, folks. It would seem Bessie has made a break for it yet again. This time, it just so happens, she's enticed a dozen of her friends to join her." He paused to offer his Bible to a broad-shouldered black man sitting just a few pews ahead of Carol and the girls on his way down the aisle. "T, I hope you don't mind teaching my lesson if I don't make it back in time. On my word, that cow is a menace."

The quiet murmur morphed into amused laughter, and Mika joined in, her eyes bright and her smile wide, even though she had little to no idea what was going on.

Carol pulled the child into her lap and hid her own smile in Mika's soft hair as Sophia likewise erupted into infectious giggles.

Lizzie was more reserved, offering up the smallest of smiles and scooting to the edge of her seat in order to get a better look at the goings-on. "What's so funny, Ma'am?"

Carol was saved from answering by the timely arrival of an old friend.

"Some of Doc Greene's cows broke out of jail," Dale Horvath informed the curious little girl with a twinkle in his eyes.

Sophia's hazel eyes lit up, and she stood up to wrap her arms around the older gentleman's waist. "Uncle Dale."

"Uncle Dale," Mika mimicked, holding out her short arms for a hug of her own.

Lizzie hung back quietly but accepted the affectionate ruffle of her hair as Dale settled himself on her other side.

"Where's Ms. Irma?" Carol whispered over the top of the girls' heads.

"It's her time to mind the nursery. I hope you girls don't mind me sitting with you until it's time to go to class."

Lizzie frowned. "I thought you said we weren't going to school."

* * *

xxx

* * *

By the time those church doors opened again, Lizzie had decided she didn't much like class ( _of any kind_ ), Sophia had made a small handful of new friends ( _Luke and Meghan, Molly and Carl_ ), and Mika had dozed off again.

Carol's arm prickled with returned sensation when Dale lifted the slight weight of the sleeping child into his arms. "Thank you," she murmured as she rubbed lightly at the abused appendage.

"If memory serves me correctly, you were well into your teens before you made it an entire service without drifting off," Dale chuckled. "You did good, Kid."

Carol smile warmly at his familiar teasing, grateful all over again for his care and kindness. After all they had been through with the loss of their natural-born parents, Andrea and Amy were lucky to call the man in front of her family. She only hoped Lizzie and Mika thought the same of her one day.

"I'm not just talking about today, you know."

Carol felt her eyes grow damp as all her misgivings and all her suppressed doubts flooded to the surface, just for a moment. 'Thank you," she said again.

Dale merely smiled back at her and clapped a hand over her shoulder. "I've got this one. Looks like you've got some catching up to do."

That was all the warning she got before a crowd of old friends and curious churchgoers converged on her, and Carol did just that, _caught_ _up_. With Annette Greene and her doe-eyed little daughter Beth. With Theodore Douglas, who nearly lifted her out of her shoes with the force of his lung-crushing hug. With a heavily pregnant Lori Grimes and Sophia's freckle-faced new friend Carl. Invitations to dinner were accepted, promises were made not to be a stranger, and play dates were scheduled as Carol bravely waded back into the deep end of a social life in King County. To say she was overwhelmed when the last well-wisher had departed the church parking lot and only Dale, Irma, and the girls remained was a gross understatement. She wanted nothing more than the peace and the comfort of her own space, and Dale, bless his heart, must have realized that.

"Irma and I were thinking we'd take these three pretty little ladies off of your hands for a few hours, grab a bite to eat at the diner in town. _Somebody_ might not have much room in her belly after all the candy corn she's eaten, though," he said pointedly.

Mika pressed a sleepy smile into the crook of his neck, and Dale brought her small hand to his mouth for a smacking kiss that made her giggle.

Irma smiled indulgently at her husband's antics and loosely draped a hand over Lizzie's shoulder as Sophia burrowed into her side. "Want us to bring you something, Dear?"

"I'm good," Carol declined softly. Allowing the older woman's embrace, she pulled back with a smile. "Do you three think you can behave yourselves?"

Mika answered with a distracted nod.

Sophia made a solemn promise, "Yes, Mama."

But it was Lizzie's response that made Dale and Irma laugh and ( _later_ ) had Carol smiling all the way home.

With a shrug of her skinny shoulders, the little girl decided honesty was the best policy. "I don't know, Ma'am."

* * *

xxx

* * *

The old Ford was back, but this time, Carol pulled up right beside it, pushing the Cherokee's door open with apologies spilling from her lips. "I'm sorry, Merle. I completely forgot about…hi. You're definitely _not_ Merle."

The girl sitting on her porch steps in her cutoff overalls and her child-sized combat boots laced all the way up to her skinned knees wasn't Merle, but she smiled like another Dixon Carol knew. With one corner of her mouth curled up in the tiniest of smirks and her blue eyes shy. She couldn't have been much older than Sophia, if she was at all.

Carol's mouth molded into frozen smile, and she felt a rising tide of emotion press against her convulsing throat. "I'm…my name's Carol. Are you…is your dad…" Merle's solid form loomed in the periphery of her suddenly blurred vision, and Carol reached out for him as he neared. Her fingers tightened around his meaty hand, and she lifted her shimmering gaze to his rugged face, bewilderment overcoming her when he cursed beneath his breath and pulled her into his side.

"Shit. _Shit_. Should have known," he rasped out. With the hand Carol didn't have a death grip on, he beckoned the child watching the two of them with open curiosity. "Enid, girl. Won't you do your old dad a favor and grab our friend Carol some water from the back of the truck?"

Carol blinked hard against the tears still welling in her eyes and braced her hands against his chest as a bubble of hysterical laughter escaped her. "You? She's yours?"

"You surprised I got a kid or you surprised I'm a daddy? Because I'm a right mind to be offended. I done told you things had changed 'round here since you been gone, Red."

Carol chewed on her lip to keep from blurting out an answer that might have done just that, and when the child returned with a cone paper cup in her hands, she gladly took it and brought it to her mouth, sipping slowly.

The girl ducked the hand that reached for her, but Merle got in a fond ruffle of her long brown hair anyway, and it couldn't have been more clear whose child she was when she turned around and gave them both that patented ear-to-ear Merle Dixon grin. She steered clear of the porch this time, making a bee-line for the two-hundred-year-old Oak and the tire swing that had hung from it for as long as Carol could remember.

Directly below the swing, courtesy of the previous day and evening's rain, rest a mud puddle about as wide as the girl was tall, and Merle cautioned her about making a mess when he noticed her running the toe of one of her boots in the sludge. "You 'member what happened the last time I took ya ass home lookin' like a hobo!"

This time, Carol bit her lip to keep from laughing, earning herself a right Dixon scowl.

"What you laughin' it up about?" Merle growled. "Girl's damn mama kept me away from the kid more than a month. Had to threaten her with gettin' the court involved."

Carol's mouth dropped, knowing how much Merle despised law enforcement in general, and her eyes grew wide. "You didn't."

Merle's lips twitched, and he wouldn't meet her intent gaze as he made a sheepish admission. "Might be I groveled a bit. Weren't the way I usually like to conduct my business on my knees."

As they had so many times growing up, Merle's crude insinuations brought a hot flush to Carol's cheeks and she pressed the paper cup and the cool water it held within against her neck.

Merle reached a hand up to scratch idly at the whiskers covering his chin. "What?" he demanded when he finally noticed the look Carol was giving him.

"Some things _haven't_ changed."

* * *

xxx

* * *

 _The more things change, the more they stay the same._

Those words kept repeating in an endless loop inside Carol's brain less than twenty minutes later as she stared, wordlessly, at a figure that had haunted her dreams since the night she'd first left this place, so long ago now.

 _The more things change, the more they stay the same._

After letting Enid play her fill and convincing Carol to let him hitch the empty U-haul to the back of his old truck ( _promising, with a mocking scout's honor, that he would deliver it safely to the nearest return station first thing in the morning_ ), Merle had collected his daughter and a handful of candy corn from Carol's sweater pockets and was backing out of her driveway when he sent her world into a tailspin with a simple request.

" _You mind givin' the boy a ride, Red? M'sure he'd be real appreciative-like."_

For a moment, an all-too brief moment, she'd been struck dumb. But reality, along with Carol's stalled heart, had come roaring back with Merle's lascivious wink and naughty smirk.

" _Tell 'im I'll leave the light on."_

Then Merle was gone—simple as that—and she'd turned around and Daryl was there. He was _there_ , and he was different, yes. He'd grown up ( _so_ _had_ _she_ ). But those wary blue eyes still belonged to the boy she'd lost her heart to all those years ago, and he was looking at her like he might have lost his heart, too, and Carol just couldn't find the words to tell him how much she'd missed him ( _every day_ ), how good it was to see him ( _so good_ ), how her heart still ached for him ( _so damn much_ ). No, she couldn't find _those_ words, but she finally mustered up a teasing accusation. "You broke into my house."

"Place is locked up tighter than fuckin' Fort Knox."

The corner of his mouth curled up in that ( _shy_ - _eyed_ ) Dixon smirk, and Carol felt her heart seize her throat. "Merle left you," she explained hoarsely.

Daryl nodded, little more than a dip of his chin, and brought his thumb to his mouth. "Figured."

Carol squeezed her hands into tight little fists, fighting the age-old urge to draw his hand away, distract him from the nervous gesture.

 _The more things change, the more they stay the same._

At a loss of anything else to say, she cleared her throat and said, "There's still some boxes."

The gentle reminder spurred Daryl into action, and he turned on his heel, bending to grab the biggest box from the stack Merle had left behind. "Where you want it?"

Carol hurried to catch up with him as he went inside, her heels clicking against the dusty hardwood floors. "It might be better if I show you." In front of her, his broad shoulders shrugged beneath the faded denim of his shirt, and she swallowed back the rest of her stupid words.

 _The more things change, the more they stay the same._

"Know my way around."

"It's been a long time," she murmured softly.

"Ain't been _that_ long." He met her eyes over his shoulder and mounted the long staircase. "Want this one in your room?"

* * *

xxx

* * *

Daryl was right.

But so was Carol, and the next couple of hours only served to drive that point home. Because they worked together, unpacking boxes and moving furniture in relative silence. But it was nothing like the easy silences of their youth. It wasn't like the time her mama and her daddy got into that big fight when she was eight years old, hurling hurtful words and Nanny Sarah's china, and she'd run away, made it no farther than the end of her own driveway. She'd walked alongside Daryl's bike for the better part of an hour, tears streaming down her dirty face as he peddled over and _over_ that same stretch of road before she felt brave enough to head back home. It wasn't like the time Merle and Daryl come home from school to find out their daddy had used his shotgun on old Bo, claimed to have put the arthritic hound out of his misery. She'd been ten years old, and it'd taken the better part of a week before she managed to clean all of the dirt from underneath her fingernails, but she'd never left Daryl's side as he buried the sweet dog. It wasn't like the time Merle left for the military with nothing more than a note left behind to say his goodbyes, and twelve-year-old Daryl climbed through her bedroom window, curled up on her cold floor, and stayed there until the night stars started to fade into morning light. It wasn't like that last night. The night before she told him she loved him, she wanted to be with him forever ( _as more than the best friend either of them had ever had_ ) _._ It wasn't like that time at all.

Daryl was quiet. But then…he always had been. He was polite. But then…he'd always been respectful.

Carol tried to get him to open up, tried to get him to talk to her, but it seemed he'd used up all this words in those first few moments outside on the porch, when time and memory and being confronted with her presence for the first time in years had snuck up on him. So she did what she used to do, back when they were first getting to know each other as children; she talked _at_ him. "Merle seems pretty hung up on that girl of his." When all the comment elicited from him was a small grunt of acknowledgment, she suppressed a sigh. "How old is she?"

"Nine."

"Sophia just turned eight."

Daryl ducked his head, fumbled behind himself for the screwdriver he needed as he worked on putting Lizzie and Mika's bunk bed back together. "Know."

Encouraged, and more than a little bit surprised, Carol remarked, "Never took Merle for a beggar."

Daryl's eyes narrowed in concentration, and a little furrow of frustration formed between his brows. "He ain't. Just loves his girl is all."

Leaving her position against the opposite wall, Carol walked behind him and pulled the lace curtains back to peer outside the window. She frowned when she realized clouds were moving back in, and the clear blue sky that'd been present when she'd woken that morning, when she'd left the church even, had all but disappeared. "You know her mama? Enid's?" Carol elaborated needlessly.

With a shake of his head, Daryl climbed to his feet and tossed the screwdriver in his hand on top of Mika's unmade mattress. "You seem awful interested in Merle's business."

Carol bit back her smile. More than just annoyed, Daryl actually sounded _jealous_ of her innocent interest in his brother, and the very idea amused her, gave her hope that maybe he wasn't as cold to her overtures of renewed friendship after all. "C'mon. You can't blame a girl for being curious. Merle's…well, he's…"

"A no good Dixon?"

Carol's smile vanished when she realized those blue eyes of his weren't looking at her with any kind of warmth at all. Their depths were bordering on chilly. "Daryl, I didn't mean that at all."

"What did you mean then? Go 'head. Tell me."

Flustered, Carol pulled her sweater tighter around her body, looked away from him only long enough to gather her thoughts. "Merle's Merle," she finally said. "He's loud and uncouth and he doesn't _do_ relationships, Daryl. He never has. I'm just wondering what kind of woman…you know what? Never mind. It was an innocent question. I don't understand why you're so worked up about it," she muttered.

"You wouldn't," Daryl grit out. "Bed's fixed. Just in time, too. Looks like your girls are home. S'time for me to go."

A glance at the window confirmed that the girls were, indeed, home, and Carol inwardly cursed Dale and Irma's timing as the girls spilled from the older couple's vehicle, racing each other up the porch steps and sounding like a stampede of baby elephants. "Daryl, wait."

"Don't need no ride home. Know the way back. Walked it before," Daryl shrugged off her show of concern. "See you 'round."

Carol hurried after him when he stalked from the bedroom. "Daryl, don't…" Any further protests she might have made faded away when she realized they had an audience, and her baby girl's hazel eyes landed accusingly on Daryl.

"Mama?"

Daryl's angry scowl softened, and he held up a hand to reassure Sophia, Lizzie and Mika, and Dale and Irma as he passed them on his way down the stairs. "Afternoon, Dale. Irma. 'Phia. Girls. I's just leavin'."

Dale was the first to speak up, but Daryl was halfway across the yard before he managed more than a few words. "Daryl, you don't have to leave on our account."

Daryl held up a hand in parting, cut across the overgrown yard to a path that was even more unkempt due to years of disuse. "See you 'round."

Carol curled her arms around Sophia's skinny shoulders when she wrapped her arms around her waist in a tight, comforting hug.

"Who was _that,_ Mama?"

"Just somebody that I used to know, Sweetie. Just somebody that I used to know."

* * *

 **Obviously, my plan to write a cute, fun, Fall-inspired Caryl story has backfired. LOL.**

 **There's a little language in this one; not enough to up the rating (YET), but we might get to that point eventually.**

 **Mistakes are all mine. Thanks so much for reading!**

 **Fedback is love.**


	3. Chapter 3

**The Way Back**

* * *

 **xx3xx**

* * *

Carol's girlhood room hadn't changed all that much. Same old wallpaper she'd always begged her parents to change, so faded and worn now, its pattern of pale roses looked like it had been painted by an impressionist's brush. Same antique vanity, with its stubborn top drawer and the crinkled Polaroid tucked in the mirror's top right corner, the smiling image of Nanny Sarah an unwitting witness to so many of Carol's firsts through the years. Same wardrobe, where Shane's letterman jacket and her ruined prom dress still hung side by side. And the same four poster bed, missing its canopy, but still massive, still utterly as lonely as it had always been.

Lost in that bed, mired down by an abundance of blankets and regrets of the past, Carol stared up at her bedroom ceiling with wide, unblinking eyes. Outside, a pastel sun started its slow ascent and twilight's purple shadows gradually faded away, but inside? Inside the stillness of the room, the light was powerless to chase away the darkness of Carol's mood. Daryl's snide words of the day before played on endless loop in her mind, as they had for many long hours during the night, and Carol frowned, the prescient push of tears causing her gaze to blur, to lose focus.

" _You wouldn't_."

"What does that even mean?" Carol's soft words were lost, swallowed up as the farmhouse's aging bones settled, and she sighed, rolling onto her side and pressing her cold nose into the crook of her elbow. She fixed her unseeing stare on the window across the room and its parted curtains, fluttering and dancing in the chill morning breeze, and his words mocked her yet again.

" _You wouldn't_."

Daryl was so _angry,_ and it hurt, probably more than it had a right to, but seeing him again? Being just an arm's reach away from him physically when they were obviously still oceans apart emotionally? It reopened all those old wounds Carol thought she'd stitched closed, and _God_. Coming home wasn't supposed to feel like _this_.

" _You wouldn't._ "

The alarm on her phone started to peal obnoxiously, and it was enough, finally, to wrench Carol back into the present. She resisted the mighty urge to smother her cell phone beneath her pillow easily enough; it was silenced with nothing more than a clumsy stab of her finger. But abandoning her warm cocoon of blankets was a harder pill to swallow, and she grimaced as she flung the covers aside to greet a cold gray morning that was definitely a marked change from the morning before, one of those wondrous little idiosyncrasies typical of Fall in Georgia. The hardwood floor was cool underfoot, _icy even_ through the barrier of her thick, fuzzy socks, and Carol hissed, feeling every hair on every inch of her body stand up in protest. Within seconds, even her freckles had goosebumps, and she stuffed her feet into her nearby boots and hurriedly shuffled across the room, untied laces trailing behind her.

The window closed with a protesting groan, and the long, leafed fingers of the tree outside scratched against the pane in a similar appeal.

Carol rubbed at the little opaque clouds left in the wake of her warm breath and peered out across the neglected yard. If the room she was standing in had not changed all that much, the passage of time had not been as kind to the old barn, which seemed to list and waver whichever way the wind blew, nor the rotting fence line, draped with wild honeysuckle and surrounded by an abundance of weeds tall enough to tower over Mika. The state of rampant disrepair all over the property, in fact, had been enough to prompt Dale to offer up his services the evening before, but Carol had gently refused the kind offer, not wanting to take further advantage of his boundless generosity when he had already done so much for her and the girls. Thoughts of the girls had her straightening, stiffening her spine against a day that promised to be chock full of new challenges, a day no doubt teeming with more of those awkward, overwrought encounters that had thus far made this homecoming of hers both a blessing and a curse. A cold little hand touching her own almost had her jumping out of her boots.

Equally as startled, Mika dropped the doll hugged loosely to her small chest to the floor and stared up at her with big, welling brown eyes and a pout of dismay, the neat braid she'd fallen to sleep with all but completely unraveled. "I'm sorry, Ms. Carol."

Carol's heart swelled with affection for the tiny girl, and she knelt, scooping Mika up when she flew into her arms and pressing a kiss of apology into her soft hair. "You don't need to be sorry, Sweetie," she murmured. "I just wasn't expecting you." Bending to snag Griselda by the hand, she placed the doll back into Mika's arms and hugged the both of them tightly as she walked back toward her bed and the inviting mound of blankets she'd so recently cast aside. "What are you doing up this early?"

Mika's small fingers toyed with the thin straps of Carol's camisole, her frigid little toes burrowed beneath the elastic waistband of her cotton panties, and she tucked her nose into the crease of her neck, shrugging. "Me and Griselda were cold, and Lizzie was hogging all the covers again."

Carol pretended to be aghast, hiding the gentle curve of her mouth in Mika's unruly cloud of hair. "Lizzie's hogging all her own covers? Again?" Mika's muffled mewl of disappointment made laughter and guilt bubble up in equal measure, and her kiss this time landed on the little girl's sleep warmed forehead. Setting the child down in the center of her bed, Carol cupped her cherubic cheeks in the palms of her hands and sighed, making a sheepish admission that held more than a kernel of truth. "I don't always like sleeping in my own bed all by myself either."

Heartened by the confession, Mika's small shoulders slumped and she burrowed back into Carol's open, waiting arms. "You don't?"

Carol shook her head. "It's big. And lonely. And I don't have anybody to snuggle with me. Sophia thinks she's too big."

Mika tipped her head back, her big brown eyes shining with love and hopefulness and acceptance. "I give good snuggles. My daddy said so. He called me his snuggle bug." With those last words, a recalled memory that seemed to surprise even her, Mika's face fell and her pout returned. "I miss my daddy."

Carol's breath caught, and those tears she'd been fighting against all morning, all through the night truth be told, were back, just like that. "I know. I miss him, too. Your daddy was my friend." He _had_ been. A really _good_ friend, kind and supportive and sweet. They'd bonded over their status as single parents to their daughters, and Carol hadn't been able to refuse Ryan when he'd asked her to take on his girls as her own. "He was such a good friend. And an even better daddy. I bet he was right. I bet you give the best snuggles." Mika's trembling smile was bright and warmed Carol's aching heart.

"You do?"

"I do," Carol nodded, stroking Mika's hair back from her face and tucking it behind her ears. "How 'bout you give me some of those snuggles right now? We still have time before we have to wake Lizzie and Sophia for school."

Mika tackle-hugged Carol to the pillows below and cuddled up nice and tight to her side like a sleepy little kitten as she pulled the blankets up to their chins. "I love you, Ms. Carol."

Lump firmly lodged in her throat, it took Carol a moment to respond, but her words were no less sincere. "I love you, too."

* * *

xxx

* * *

Carol pulled into the last available parking spot at the elementary school and killed the Cherokee's engine with a sigh. "We're here."

Mika was the first to unbuckle her seat belt, sliding free of her booster seat and eyeing the nondescript brick building with much more awe than it warranted. "Lizzie, look. That's your new school. It's so big."

Lizzie remained stoic in the face of her sister's wonder, her hands folded neatly in her lap, but Carol had to smother a smile. Once upon a time, at this very school, she'd had much the same reaction as Mika. How times had changed. "What do you think, Lizzie?"

The little girl simply shrugged in response, wholly unimpressed.

"Sophia?" Carol tried, hoping for but not expecting an answer. When no response came, she sighed again, louder this time as she regarded the grumpy little thundercloud in the backseat currently glaring at anyone that so much as peeked in her direction. "Sophia, I'm sure your lucky socks aren't lost forever. Did you check your backpack?"

Sophia crossed her arms across her chest with a tiny huff of annoyance. "They're not in there. You know I can't go inside without them, Mama."

"Maybe they're in one of the boxes we haven't unpacked yet," Carol offered. It was a distinct possibility, after all. Though they'd made considerable progress the day before, the girls' bedtime had loomed all too soon and getting everyone bathed, dressed in their pajamas, and tucked in at a decent hour was not as easy as it'd been when it was just Sophia. They'd put off the rest of the unpacking for another day and called it an early night, but morning had seemingly dawned before they'd had time to close their eyes. At least it had felt that way to Carol, heartsick and sleep-deprived. "I promise. I'll look for them when I get back home. Mika will help."

"We'll look in every box," Mika vowed solemnly.

" _Every_ box," Carol reiterated, tightening her fingers around the steering wheel as she met her daughter's hazel eyes over her shoulder. "Sophia," she pleaded. "We don't have time for this, Sweetie. You know we still have to get you and Lizzie checked in."

"Here," Lizzie volunteered, pulling her own fuzzy pink talisman out of her backpack. "You can borrow my rabbit's foot."

Carol's heart melted. Such gestures were routine from Mika, but from Lizzie? Not even a month ago, they were not necessarily unheard of, but grudging. Coming from Lizzie now, such a gesture was tantamount to a grand declaration of affection, and she wasn't the only one that realized that.

Sophia's arms fell to her sides, and her eyes softened. "You really mean it?"

Lizzie nodded, holding out the good luck charm.

"Thank you, Lizzie."

Carol's sigh this time was one of relief and she gave the little girl a warm smile. "Yes. Thank you, Lizzie." Pocketing her car keys, she took a deep, replenishing breath. "Now. Who's ready to go inside?"

"I am, Ma'am."

"Me, too," Sophia answered.

"Me, three," Mika giggled.

* * *

xxx

* * *

With Sophia happily ensconced in her new classroom and Mika enjoying an impromptu little art session and cookies in the secretary's office, Carol walked the winding halls of the little school with Lizzie and a stalwart figure from her own days spent within its walls by her side, Principal Deanna Monroe. Diminutive in stature but larger than life, the woman still commanded her attention after all these years, demanded her respect, and Carol, for once, found herself just as speechless as Lizzie.

"The place really hasn't changed that much. Storms a few years back damaged this wing, and our kindergarteners and first graders spent a couple of years in trailers, but you'll see for yourself. Everything is back to normal, and your classroom, Lizzie, is still one of my favorite rooms in the entire school." The older woman's eyes crinkled at the corners when she smiled and dryly remarked, "It looks like it's one of Mr. Grimes's favorite rooms as well."

Rick Grimes parted from his wife's smiling mouth with great reluctance, his cheeks pinking beneath his shadow of a beard and his eyes studying the pointed toes of his boots as if they were of utmost fascination. One large, protective hand cupped the swell of the child pressing between them and the other braced itself on the frame of the open door.

He looked remarkably like the little boy he'd once been, hand caught in her nanny Sarah's cookie jar, and Carol stifled a snort of laughter when Principal Monroe took her teasing a step further.

"This is not the type of education I wish to offer my students, Mr. Grimes. Mrs. Grimes," she added, pointedly including Lori in her good-natured admonitions as she peered around the door to find roughly a dozen little faces pretending ( _badly_ ) not to be hanging on their every word and action. "If you'll excuse me, I'm going to introduce Lizzie to her new classmates while you two wrap things up here." Holding out her hand, she beckoned Lizzie to follow her. "Come along, child."

The door closed with a resounding thud behind her, and one more look at Lori, at Rick, had Carol dissolving into a fit of girlish giggles that Lori soon joined. "I see you two haven't changed."

Lori's bright smile dimmed, faltered, _froze_.

Rick's chagrined expression tightened.

The reactions to her innocent statement lasted but a millisecond, were gone in a blink of Carol's eye as Rick stepped forward, gathering her in a tight bear hug that stole the breath from her lungs. When she pulled back to study them once more, their smiles were bright again, but she could see the hairline cracks in the perfect façade they presented to the unknowing eye, see the obvious work and effort it'd taken to piece things back together again in the lingering hold of their hands.

"Lori told me you were back. I've been meaning to stop by."

Carol let him off the hook, gently teasing, "It's only been a couple of days, Rick."

"Really? Feels closer to a decade."

This time, Carol's smile slid away, and Lori gave her husband's hand a forceful squeeze.

"Rick."

Rick rubbed a rough hand over his tired face, sighed. "I'm sorry. I didn't mean it to come out like that. I just…it's good to have you back home. It's been a while. A lot of things are the same, but so many are different, too. You have a lot to catch up on. _We_ have a lot to catch up on. If that's something you're interested in."

"I'm interested. You know I am."

* * *

xxx

* * *

"This seat taken?"

Merle's toothy mug greeted her when she looked up from her stack of classifieds, and Carol rolled her eyes, a smile twitching at her lips as he slid into the booth opposite her without waiting for her express permission. "Guess it doesn't matter."

"Right answer," Merle crowed, stealing a wedge of Mika's pancakes with his thick fingers and dripping syrup all over the tabletop. "Mornin', L'il Bit. What you doin' out of school? You sick or somethin'?"

Mika wormed her little body beneath Carol's protective wing, staring across the table at Merle with wide, worried brown eyes.

A few more minutes of silence and Merle mused, "Don't talk much, does she?"

"You say enough for all three of us," Carol quipped, recapping her pen and picking up her lukewarm coffee. One sip, and she grimaced, setting the chipped mug back down and pushing it aside. "What do you want, Merle?"

"Always could read me like a book, Red. S'what I like most 'bout you," Merle remarked, hailing the waitress and ordering them both new cups of coffee. Only when she returned, and he'd taken a long pull of the steaming liquid gold, whistling and swearing beneath his breath, did he speak again. "Shit, that stuff would burn the Devil's left nut off."

"Merle!" Carol barked.

"What?" he winked exaggeratedly. "Kid's got a mute button. Right?" That comment earned him a small curl of Mika's lips, and Merle grinned like he had won the Georgia lottery, turning on the charm. Digging his wallet out of his back pocket, he held out a couple of bills to Mika. "Why don't you see Sherry 'bout gettin' some change, L'il Bit? Playin' us somethin' nice on the jukebox? Maybe winnin' yer mama a pretty prize?"

At Carol's nod, Mika accepted Merle's thinly veiled bribe, carefully crawling over Carol's lap and sliding from the booth. Soon, the pretty brunette waitress was taking her hand and leading her to the opposite end of the small diner where the jukebox and a few money traps awaited.

"Don't do that again."

Merle's frown deepened the lines between his brows. "Don't do what?"

Carol leaned back in her seat, matched his expression as she reached for her own cup of coffee. "Don't play dumb. You know what."

"Why not? Just 'cause you ain't that baby's blood don't mean you not her mama. S'written all over her face. Yours, too."

Carol's frown deepened. "Things aren't settled. Not as much as they could be. Don't be filling her head with ideas."

"The hell you gettin' at, Red? What do you mean things ain't settled?"

Ryan had been an only child in a long line of only children, but his late wife? Somewhere out there, his wife had a half-sister, a woman who _someday_ might decide she wanted to get to know her little nieces, and that someday might happen sooner than later, now that Carol had decided to move forward and formally adopt the girls. It was a possibility that Andrea was trying to prepare her for, best as she could. It was a possibility Carol wanted to push away and ignore with every sweet snuggle Mika gave her, every small breakthrough Lizzie made. It was a possibility she didn't want to openly acknowledge and so, she shook her head. "Things aren't settled. Let's just leave it at that. It's not what you really want to talk to me about anyway. We both know it. Just spit it out, Merle."

"You sure that's what you want, Red? Don't say I didn't warn you."

Swallowing hard, gathering up all her courage, Carol answered in the affirmative. "I'm sure."

Merle smiled, but his eyes were hard, clear and ready to pierce through any bullshit excuse she might try to offer him. "Any fool with two eyes can see yer still hung up on my baby brother. When you two gonna stop fuckin' 'round? Better yet. When you two gonna _start_?"

* * *

xxx

* * *

The Dixon brothers always _did_ have a way of getting in her head, and try as she might, Carol just couldn't push Merle's comments aside; his off-color method of stating the obvious lingered in the back of her mind the rest of the day, and she couldn't give anything else on her mile-long to-do list the attention it deserved. She quickly gave up even _trying_ , retreating back to the farmhouse with her stack of classifieds and her sleepy almost-daughter and diving headlong into a task she'd truthfully be just as content putting off indefinitely. The boxes wouldn't unpack themselves, though, and the Maytag downstairs was already showing its age and irritable, unpredictable nature. Clean clothes for herself and the girls was a rapidly dwindling commodity, so Carol tucked Mika and Griselda in for their afternoon nap and started with the boxes in Sophia's bedroom, on a promised mission to find the pair of elusive lucky socks. She was halfway through her second box without a single sighting when she heard the knock.

Annette Greene beamed at her when she pulled the door open minutes later, promptly pushing a Tupperware container into her hands and holding up a steaming thermos. "Cookies. And cider. I hope you and your girls like Snickerdoodles. Beth helped me make them last night. Maggie's young man ate half his body weight of them, but there was still enough left over to feed a small army."

Some might say chocolate was her Achilles heel, but Carol's fondness for cookies in general had always had the regrettable effect of loosening her tongue, a fact Mrs. Greene was well aware of and had exploited more than once in the past. That the older woman came bearing such gifts was not a surprise. It was a foregone conclusion. "And you thought of me and my girls? That's us all right," Carol remarked, punctuating her statement with a small, self-deprecating laugh. Taking a step back, she invited her unannounced guest inside. "Please. Come in, Mrs. Greene."

"Annette," the vet's wife insisted, following Carol to the kitchen and doing little to hide her curiosity. On the contrary, her wide, friendly gaze soaked in their surroundings. "It's like stepping back through time itself."

For Carol, it had been. It _was._ Through all her life's ups and downs, the farmhouse had remained the same, a monument of sorts to the great grandmother that had had a hand in raising three generations within its walls. Her nanny Sarah had died in her sleep upstairs when Carol was thirteen years old. Her parents had split up, _permanently_ , less than a year later, leaving only Carol and her mama and the postcards her daddy sent them in the sprawling old house. First they came from all over the United States. Like clockwork they showed up, pictures of big city lights and canyons wide and wondrous. Pictures of rolling blue oceans and bridges suspended over mist. Pictures of snow-capped mountains and desert flowers in bloom. Then they started to slow, started to come less frequently. Pictures of tall towers with clocks and crumbling castles. Pictures of winding, serpentine walls and opera houses shaped like shells. Pictures of cathedrals and buildings that climbed to the sky. Finally, they just stopped altogether, and the history, the regrets held inside the farmhouse's walls, became too much for her mama. She'd had one foot out of the front door long before Carol had ever stepped off that dark cliff and into a marriage with a man wholly unsuited for her, a man who'd quickly folded under the pressure of living a lie and had taken it out on her with first his hurtful words, then his angry hands. Unlike Carol, though, her mama'd yet to return, but nobody had to tell Annette Greene that. Her well-meaning neighbor knew more than most, and there was little point in denying it. Besides, all that was behind her now, the daddy that had just _faded_ from her life and the husband that would never touch her or her daughter again. Softly, Carol voiced her own agreement, "Not much has changed."

"But everything _has_ ," the other woman murmured just as quietly, taking a seat at the table. It was a seat the Greene women had occupied often enough over the years. Annette now. Jo before her. They'd shared tea and cookies and conversation with their Mason counterparts for as long as the farmhouse had been standing, and though they weren't even of the same generation, it seemed Annette was here to continue the tradition.

Carol placed the container of cookies on the table in front of her guest and crossed the room to the cupboards, where she rose on tiptoe to retrieve a couple of faded blue mugs from the top shelf. She carried them with her to the old wooden table that had always seemed so big and empty in a house occupied by so few and set them down on its scarred surface. She helped herself to a cookie while Annette poured them both some cider, and the corners of her mouth curled as soon as the sugary sweetness hit her taste buds. "Go ahead. Ask. We both know you want to."

Annette didn't even attempt to feign ignorance. She hid her smile behind her mug and lifted a sly brow. "All I'm doing is offering a friendly ear. If you just happened to feel so compelled…"

Shaking her head, Carol drew one of her legs into the chair with her and grabbed another cookie, all but cramming into her mouth while she contemplated the wisdom of spilling the current confused state of her heart to the first person that asked nicely, and with cookies, no less. Taking a sip of her own cider, she sighed in resignation and set the mug down, wrapping her arms around both of her legs and tucking her knees close to her chest. "I just…I don't…" Carol's eyes grew warm with unexpected tears as her mind conjured up the image of Daryl from the day before, so closed off and so angry, and she tried again. "Things just got off track and he hurt me and then…"

The expression on Annette's face softened into solemnity, and she cradled her mug in front of her with both of her hands, looking every bit the mother figure that she was when words failed Carol completely. "Then _you_ hurt _him_."

Carol covered her trembling lips with her hand, blinked against the sting of the tears that had started to fall against her will. "I hurt him, and I don't know how to fix that. I don't even know if I can. If it's even possible for us…I miss him, Annette. I miss my best friend, and I don't know how to get him back. I don't even know where to begin."

"Start with the truth. That's as good a place as any."

* * *

xxx

* * *

Carol picked the girls up from school a couple of hours later wearing a pair of oversized sunglasses and an apologetic smile. For lack of a better explanation, it seemed the lucky socks had fallen prey to whatever sneaky, cosmic force lost socks tended to fall victim to, and she didn't relish breaking the news to her young daughter that she'd ultimately been unsuccessful in her search. Not one bit. All her worry was for naught, though, as Sophia had other things on her mind.

"Mama! Did you know that we live right by the Pumpkin Patch?"

Mika's eyes rounded with wonder, but Lizzie looked unfazed by the revelation, plopping down in her seat and stowing her backpack on the floor between her feet before buckling her seatbelt.

Carol's apologetic smile morphed into a genuine grin at how very different the two little girls were, how excited Sophia seemed by something she'd taken for granted as a child, and she nodded. "I'm aware. Dr. Greene has his office out there, too."

That little revelation piqued Lizzie's interest, and her blue eyes narrowed. "The same doctor Greene that has all the cows?"

"The same one," Carol answered her, shifting the Cherokee into drive and following the slow-moving caravan as it moved around the small half-loop that led back to the main road. "He's an animal doctor."

"You mean like a veterinarian?" Sophia brightened even further and she practically bounced in place, her safety belt the only thing anchoring her to reality. "Does he have puppies?"

"Lots of barn cats, too," Carol told them as she merged onto the main highway, mentally plotting out a route she must have taken hundreds of times as a child. Thousands, really. The little town hadn't been as populated back then, but muscle memory took over, and there were enough echoes of familiarity to assure her she was indeed on the right track. "Least he used to."

"Can we have one Ms. Carol? Please?"

"Please, Mama?" Sophia added her two cents.

Both little girls wore their most innocent, angelic faces, their eyes pure and their hands prayerful, and Carol just had to laugh. "What about you, Lizzie? You don't like puppies or kittens?"

Lizzie lifted her skinny shoulder in the slightest of shrugs, but there was an unmistakable glimmer of interest in her eyes. "I don't know."

"You don't know?" Carol teased, seeing the sign up ahead for the little locally owned grocery her parents had frequented and Nanny Sarah before them. She flipped on her blinker, the whistle and the rumble of a distant train audible even from miles away. "Really?"

"We ain't had a pet before, Ms. Carol," Mika divulged. "Our daddy said the ladyland wouldn't let us."

"Landlady." Lizzie muttered out the correction, her eyes downcast. "Least not a real, live one."

The landlady, Carol knew, likely hadn't been the only one to refuse the presence of a pet in the Samuels' household; Ryan's doctors had probably had equal reservations about the idea. Her good humor started to fade, and like so many things, she regretted pressing the issue. Boy, did she _ever_. Her daughter's next comments dredged up memories best left forgotten.

"I had a goldfish once," Sophia remarked, a small furrow forming between her brows. "I _think_. Maybe I dreamed it. Was it real, Mama?"

Pretending not to hear her, Carol instead turned on the radio and the poppy beats of one of the girls' favorite songs filled the interior of the Cherokee, then the girls' sweet voices themselves.

"Turn it up, Ms. Carol!"

"Yeah, Mama. Please?"

* * *

xxx

* * *

The chain store on the edge of King County was no doubt more spacious and had a much more varied selection, but Nanny Sarah had always sworn by _Mary's_ _Market_ , and Carol couldn't deny the little store had its own quirky sort of appeal. Its shelves were well stocked, with big name and locally produced items alike, and it didn't lack for customers. In fact, it was much more crowded than Carol had anticipated for an early Monday evening, and the intimate maze of aisles would have felt overwhelmingly claustrophobic in its design if she didn't have the chatter of the girls to distract her.

"Carl calls Mr. Mamet a nerd, but I like him, Mama. He's _real_ nice."

"That's good, Sweetie," Carol murmured, tweaking Mika's thick braid when the little girl's knobby knee dug painfully into her thigh as she wiggled and shifted restlessly in the child seat. She was almost too big for it, but Carol wanted her where she could keep her eyes on her—losing her once in a department store was enough for a lifetime—and Lizzie was already holding on to the end of the cart. "What about you, Lizzie? Did you like your teacher?"

"I guess," Lizzie mumbled. "She's fat."

"Lizzie!" Carol sputtered.

Sophia's brows frowned right along with her mouth, and she stopped in her tracks, dropping her hand from the cart to her small hip. "That's Carl's mama you're talking about, and she's _not_ fat. She's having a baby. Tell her, Mama."

"Mrs. Grimes is pregnant, Lizzie."

"With lots of babies?" Mika asked innocently.

Carol bit her lip, _hard,_ and shook her head, not trusting her voice. Luckily, Sophia had no such problems, and she promptly set Mika and Lizzie straight.

"Just one. Carl's little sister. His mama and daddy told him he gets to pick her name. He wants to name her Judith."

Lizzie's nose wrinkled. "That's an old lady's name."

"That's what I told him."

Lizzie stumbled from her perch in surprise, and Mika started wiggling again, this time in an effort to get a better look at the boy standing at the end of the aisle, his feet spread wide and his arms wrapped around a box of Lucky Charms.

Carol winced and shifted away from the bony little knee, looking down when she felt her daughter's small hand slide in her back pocket.

"That's Ron Anderson. He's in my class. I don't like him," Sophia whispered. "He's mean."

Carol studied the boy with new eyes, smoothing a comforting hand over her daughter's soft hair. The kid was lanky, a head taller than Sophia at least, with shaggy brown hair that fell into his eyes. He wore a thick black hoodie, a bit overboard for a day that had warmed up nicely, and a pair of jeans with holes in both knees. Nothing exceptional, nothing too out of the ordinary, but still. It was all in his demeanor, defiant and daring, and she knew exactly why he rubbed her little girl the wrong way. Not seeing a likely parent around, she straightened and softly scolded the child. "That's not a very nice thing to say."

"Mr. Grimes isn't nice. Why should _I_ be?"

"Hey!" Sophia cried.

"Mrs. Grimes is nice," Lizzie interjected. "I just said she's fat."

"I'm not talking about Mrs. Grimes, Stupid. You deaf or something?"

"Ron Anderson! Apologize this instant."

The skinny shoulders slumped under his mother's hands, but the brown eyes, what little bit that Carol could see of them, still held a note of open defiance, and the child's apology was half-hearted at best. Carol didn't dwell on it, though. She was too fixated on other things. Like the eerily familiar hazel eyes staring back at her from a pretty face. Like the little blond moppet sitting astride a pair of broad shoulders she'd recognize anywhere. Sophia's cool hand slid into her own, and Carol swallowed, grounding herself as her baby laced their fingers together in a subconscious attempt at comfort. Then she cleared her throat and attempted a smile. "Jessie. _Daryl_."

* * *

 **All mistakes are mine.**

 **Hope you enjoyed it.**

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